Our family has been following ‘Le Tour de France’ avidly for the past three weeks and sitting glued to the DVR for 4 hours a day has sadly encroached on my productivity. I can’t believe how invested I became in the 3000 km bike race around France. I must admit that the aerial shots of all the Chateau and Churches has really whetted my appetite and has managed to really fire me up for our September in France.
Boys in spandex notwithstanding I did manage to knit quite a few of these sweet seed bead necklaces while glued to the telly.
I’ve knit the pendant necklaces in three different styles which are directly from Louisa Chadwick’s’ pattern book. My only contribution is my colour choices, gauge and finishing embellishments. They are amazingly fun to knit and end up being about 3 inches in length – soooo tiny for having more than 1000 seed beads in each!
This is the beginners’ pattern and it is the easiest to knit as the increments are easy to remember.
This pattern is very much like the first but has a more tailored look.
This pattern is by far my favourite and is definitely the one you have to pay the most attention to while knitting. I love the diamonds!
I was asked recently how my Vogue blouse turned out and…..even though I had to pack everything up and put it all away several times, I have managed to complete the white cotton version.
I rarely sample while weaving, but sewing is another matter entirely – this is my sample blouse in 100% cotton. I am a petite size so I had to alter every piece to fit, thankfully it all worked out! I can’t believe how much sewing and unpicking I did! It seems that if there were two ways to read the pattern I always chose the gauche! The pattern is very well laid out, but I over analyzed the collar to the point that I was ready to toss the whole thing. When I just followed the directions, it worked out just fine. I am now an expert in flat felled seams!
Regardless of the lack of sun our garden is doing amazingly well. We are already dining very well on peas, beans, cucumbers, herbs and the inevitable zucchini. We have 64 tomato plants in 16 varieties that have set fruit and just need some serious sun to get sweet and plump.I have the loom loaded up and waiting to go and hopefully I will have something on topic next time.
I had to try a lot of different colours of weft to go with the green of the warp. If the colour was too dark, slate grey for instance, it leached the colour from the warp. If the colour was too light like yellow it drew all the attention to the weft. Blue was the best colour but none of the four different shades that we have really worked. 
I didn’t take any photos of the Crackle because it didn’t work with the colour of the warp. The weft was too light coloured and the pattern wasn’t balanced. I knew that there wasn’t going to be any weft that I could use so I decided to scrap the whole Crackle idea.
This pattern is a joy to weave, the pattern develops quickly and the warp and weft floats pick up wonderful luster. The finished scarf is really pretty, I just love the circles.
The scarf needed a little something to help it along, like beads! I haven’t been beading scarves lately but something about this scarf just needed a bit of sparkle. Luckily the bead stash just happened to have the perfect colour!
Rarely have I been so challenged by colour but the end result was worth the struggle.
We also noticed that we don’t have a lot of lace weaves in the scarves so we are going to be killing two birds with one stone, using solid colours and lace weaves together. The scarf that I am doing is a Twill Lace in blue Bamboo weft and blue Tencel in the warp. I really like playing with highlights and tones as it adds interest to what could be a plain scarf.
I liked the pattern so much that I did it again with yellow Bamboo and yellow Tencel. I love the fact that one side is weft faced medallions and so shiny from the Tencel and the other side is warp faced medallions and is matte from the Bamboo. The play of the shine and matte really make the pattern stand out.
For the first time I had a problem with Tencel, the yellow one, we had bought a large cone and there is black machine oil marks throughout the cone, it was really frustrating as some of them are faint but once it is woven and next to other picks you can really see it. I spent a lot of time unweaving these marks. I did leave some of the fainter marks because they were hard to see but with light behind the scarf they could be seen (so after it was off the loom) but they have washed out which I am really thankful otherwise I would have a new scarf!
I am always astonished by the difference a hard pressing makes on the left the yellow scarf hasn't been pressed. The shine that seems to magically appear from beneath the steam press and the scarf now has a liquid movement. The pattern really pops after the pressing also.
I love the play of colours with these scarves. The two tones of colour really bring a depth and interest to the scarves. Also I really love this pattern, it was easy to weave and so rewarding. It is definitely going to be a 'go to' pattern for me.
There is a little tree in the back garden that has a new nest by a Cedar Waxwing. She is the prettiest bird with a lovely black mask and the shiniest smoothest feathers. The tree is really special because there is also a Robin’s nest just a couple of branches below so the tree it is a now a condominium! 
I purchased an amazing Vogue pattern and have been trying to get it done for the past three days! Life and house viewings seem to be getting in my way! Today I’m determined to get it done…. I'm making one blouse out of 100% white cotton (I'll live with the fine wrinkles to avoid the awful feel of polyester!) and once I've figured it all out I've purchased some beautiful silk noil fabric for my 'special' blouse.
I rarely weave the same scarf twice without making a number of changes. In this case I changed the warp colour to Moss Green and the weft to Lemongrass. I made the scarf a tad narrower and moved the positions of the spot lace.
I wanted a clear asymmetrical vertical line and working with three blocks achieved this. 
I changed the sett from 28 epi to 24 epi and I’m thrilled with the result, it has a wonderful light feel. The tone on tone colours just shimmer with one side being predominantly Moss Green and the other being Lemongrass.
I thought nothing of it and just cut it out and tied the yarn back together and proceeded to finish the pirn. 
When I started to weave with this new pirn I noticed that the yarn was distinctly different – much heavier in grist! It seems that when the manufacturer repaired the broken end they carried additional fibre for yards and yards. I was despondent thinking that I couldn’t finish my project!
I wound the larger yarn off the pirn and went back to the tube and started winding off the thick grist. What a waste!
This lump in where the manufacturer finally got back to the correct grist of bamboo….I was so happy to find this spot. I was sure that my lovely scarf was going to end up as 28 inches of scrap….thankfully it’s going to be finished, just a little shorter than my usual 70 inches.
Lace weaves seemed to be the best option for these solid or tone on tone scarves as the texture would provide interest that one colour patterned twill might not have. My new line of scarves is named for grape varieties (after all I do live in British Columbia’s biggest grape growing area), so this golden beauty is called Malbec. The weave structure is dropped tabby on eight shafts that I’ve turned and amended to weave vertically on ten shafts. 
I’ve woven the scarf using 2 tones of gold 2/8 tencel, one in the warp and the other in the weft. This weave structure has floats on one side that run vertically, in one tone of gold and horizontally on the other side in the second tone. Using the tone on tone gives amazing depth of colour. 
The foil for the unwoven areas is a 50/50 tabby, so the scarf has amazing structural integrity. 
In my enthusiasm to get going I forgot to change my reed, so wove this scarf at 28 epi…and it turned out stiff as a board off the loom. I must admit I was a tad worried.
In the past I’ve always twisted my fringe before I wash the scarf, but for some reason I’ve found that my knots move around after washing. I’m sure it’s the miniscule differences in the take up while twisting. This has meant that I’ve had to fiddle with the fringes twice – not fun. This time I decided to lightly braid my fringes and wash the scarf, then twist the fringes when they were dry…..this really worked for me. I had no trouble undoing the loose braid when I hung the scarf to dry and twisting after washing was easy and the knots stayed where I put them! 
Thankfully Tencel is an extremely forgiving medium and after washing this scarf has beautiful drape and feel….whew!
When I first started weaving one of the first projects that I did was Bead Leno. I absolutely loved it! So when I found a ball of hand dyed yellow/orange/red 2/20 Cotton/Tencel I automatically thought Bead Leno.
For some reason I didn’t like weaving it this time. I wove and unwove numerous times getting the same result and disliking it. I didn’t like my edges or the fact the scarf was getting narrower as I wove.
The warp was threaded with a straight 4 shaft twill and I tried to find a pattern that I liked but nothing leaped off the computer screen. I like patterns that are busy and complicated and I wanted to keep to 4 shafts so the best weave structure to go to was Crackle. I love the shapes and colours that Crackle produces.
The weft is black 2/20 Tencel and the pattern repeat is 180 picks. On the computer the centre motif looks like a honeycomb, all hexagonal. But when I was weaving the area where the pattern starts again came across the stronger image. Which I didn’t really like but the guild meeting was the next day and I only had a couple of hours until bedtime to start and finish the scarf! I didn’t want to bring the placemats as I was still upset by them, and by the way thank you for all the great comments. The placemats have made it into the remaking box instead of the trash.
The scarf was almost finished by bedtime I had about 10 inches to finish weaving in the morning then twizzling, washing and pressing. I thought I was going to be OK because the meeting was at 7pm, until my Mum said that we were going in early to update the library and we were leaving after lunch. Yikes! I was rushing to the finish when I realized that my hemstitching looked funny. It was upside down.
After doing it again, I added black threads to the fringe, to help transition the black; otherwise the yellow fringe looked jarring. Then I got the scarf washed and damp pressed, it would have to dry on the road. During the pressing I noticed the tension and beat issues that I had with the scarf. Ooops.
From a distance the scarf looks great. I love all the little motifs that I can pick out, the pinecones on the edges, the circle in the centre and the bowties. I don’t usually do such a busy pattern with a variegated warp but the depth of colours and shine that this scarf has is amazing!
I had put on enough warp for two scarves so I changed the treadling for the second scarf to get rid of the jarring transition between pattern repeats. I also picked a different weft. I went with the top choice which is orange 2/10 Tencel, the other two are hand dyed singles silk.
I like what the larger grist weft does to the pattern; also I did an advancing repeat so the pattern was also elongated. The shapes that are made are incredible.
I ran out of weft so the scarf is quite short but I love it. The warmth of the yellow and orange are just wonderful. I love the jigsaw effect of the Crackle, just stunning.
Below is a picture of the two scarves side by side and the difference is just amazing. The pattern shows much better with the orange scarf and the shine is marvelous.
I have learned a lot of lessons with this warp and I am glad that I didn’t do Bead Leno. I love Crackle!!
The pattern is a ten shaft, ten treadle advancing twill. It was woven as drawn in and has only a three thread float. The pattern repeat is 33 threads, so it goes on extremely easily and weaves quickly. The warp was 2/20 hand painted silk, and while the painted warp was lovely it really posed a huge set of problems. 
Every weft that I tried seemed to blend in with one of the colours or the other, so basic black was my best option. It wasn’t the option that I wanted because it masked and changed the values of the warp colours. 
The warp was very lively in colour when I dyed it, and now it’s very subdued….ah well, the best laid plans and all that! 
The great thing about this scarf is the optical illusions that the pattern produced. The scarf is totally flat, but appears to be a series of raised pillows – very cool. The reverse of the scarf is the essentially the same. 
After looking at the grapes on my arbour which are budding up nicely – Pinot Gris came to mind as a name for this scarf as it has all the same colours as the grape variety.
Our weather has not been stellar this year, but my faithful clematis vines are almost all in bloom now, so I thought I’d share a few photos I took this morning. This clematis is pale pink with lilac stripes and has blossoms the size of dinner plates – really massive!
This is a local native variety and soon the whole fence will be covered in these sweet yellow bells and then the seed heads give another great show in the autumn.
This is one of my oldest vines, it was here when we bought the house twenty years ago and the flowers are a dark magenta, it will completely cover on side of my garden shed by fall.
Not too many of these vibrant purple with pink stripes are in bloom right now, but soon they will put on a huge display.
An electric red violet is the closest I can describe this one….so pretty.
I used to have six or seven peony varieties, but it seemed as soon as they started to bloom we would get rain and then I’d be left with a huge mess – this pink peony is the last man standing!